Travels with Rhody » camera phones http://www.travelswithrhody.net/wordpress The personal blog of Wade Roush Tue, 20 Jul 2010 03:07:06 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.4 en hourly 1 Ansel Adams Meets Apple: The Camera Phone Craze in Photography http://www.travelswithrhody.net/wordpress/2009/09/25/ansel-adams-meets-apple-the-camera-phone-craze-in-photography/ http://www.travelswithrhody.net/wordpress/2009/09/25/ansel-adams-meets-apple-the-camera-phone-craze-in-photography/#comments Sat, 26 Sep 2009 01:04:50 +0000 admin http://www.travelswithrhody.net/wordpress/?p=10 Seattle-based commercial photographer Chase Jarvis is known for his arresting, color-saturated images of people in motion—skiing, swimming, somersaulting. He’s also known for (literally) trademarking the phrase “the best camera is the one you have with you.” His point is that you don’t an expensive SLR to take great pictures. You can do a lot with the camera in your pocket or purse—which more likely than not is a camera phone.

This week, Jarvis took his slogan to the next level, launching a trio of products—a book, an iPhone application, and a photo-sharing community on the Web—intended to encourage all photographers, pro and amateur alike, to get more creative with their camera phones. This cross-media campaign is a brilliant concept—both as a digital-arts-education project and as a piece of self-promotion for Jarvis and his studio—and it also happens to fit in really well with the theme I’ve been writing about in this space throughout September in “Seven Projects to Stretch your Digital Wings,” Parts 1, 2, and 3. So, if you’ve got an iPhone, go spend $2.99 on Jarvis’s app, called “Best Camera,” and consider today’s column Project #8.

There are more than 1,300 photography-related apps in the iTunes App Store, but as far as I know, Best Camera is the only one that comes with a dedicated community of other iPhone users. The app allows you to take a picture with the iPhone’s built-in camera, apply a range of cool digital filters and effects, and then upload your finished photo to a gallery that’s constantly being updated, in real time, with new photos from other Best Camera users. You can give the photos you like best a thumbs-up, and browse photos either by popularity or recentness.

This is an excerpt from my September 25, 2009 World Wide Wade column. Click here to continue reading the column at Xconomy.

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